Posts Tagged ‘Boycott’

A senior official in the BDS movement has admitted that the “boycott” of Israel is limited to areas that don’t hurt the boycotters too much.

In a series of emails obtained by The Jewish Press, a leader of the BoycottIsrael.info website confirmed that “the BDS campaign, supports a boycott of Israeli institutions, not a blanket boycott of all Israeli individuals.”

The emails were prompted by a news article about Israeli doctors from Haifa who volunteered their time in May to treat hundreds of patients in northern Ethiopia. BDS activists were asked whether Ethiopians would have correctly boycotted the Israeli doctors, in order to show their disgust with the Zionist enterprise and support for the “Palestinians”.

The BoycottIsrael website calls for “Supporting the Palestinian BDS call from Within, and claims to be inspired by the South African struggle against apartheid. The website authors are “especially opposed to the international community’s decision to boycott the Palestinians in the Occupied Palestinian Territories,” but not to Hamas attacks on Israeli civilians or to the abduction of teenagers in the name of “national liberation”). They say that “the ‘occupation’ will end only when its cost for Israelis, its elites in particular, outweighs the benefits.”

Seems, however, that even BDSers recogniser the benefits of Israeli expertise, not only for “Israeli elites,” but also for “oppressed” Palestinians: “I’ve never heard a Palestinian civil society call for people not to receive urgent medical treatment from someone,” wrote Ofer N. an anonymous individual who responded to the ‘contact us’ email form on the website.

But when challenged on the scope of the boycott – the maxillofacial surgeries were not emergency procedures, and the doctors in question visited Ethiopia as representatives of Rambam Medical Center in Haifa – Ofer confirmed that the “boycott” was limited to those areas where boycotters aren’t too inconvenienced.

“I have never heard a Palestinian civil society call for people not to receive urgent medical treatment from someone,” Ofer repeated. “(But) when it comes to everyday matters, as opposed to emergency, people all over the world are asked to boycott Israeli institutions, including Rambam hospital.”

Q: Do the “everyday matters” you boycott include the use of mobile phone and computer technology, much of which can be traced directly back to Israeli companies?

A: As for Intel and others, there are campaigns in which people are asked to look for alternatives.

France, Italy and Spain issued warnings to their citizens against doing business with Jews who live in “unacceptable” sections of Israel.

In Paris, rather than attempt to tackle a wave of Judeophobia unseen since the Vichy government collaborated with the Nazis, the foreign ministry is now pushing French investors and businesspeople not to invest, buy land or do business in Judea, Samaria, eastern Jerusalem or the Golan Heights.

A statement on the foreign ministry’s website advises against investing, purchasing land, or engaging in economic activity in the these territories.

“We call upon citizens or business people who are considering becoming involved in economic activity in the settlements to seek appropriate legal advice before going ahead,” said the foreign ministry statement, according to a translation from the French published on the European Jewish Press website.

EJP quoted a French diplomat, who said the announcement is part of a coordinated effort by Europe’s largest countries — Germany, Britain, France, Italy and Spain — to curtail economic cooperation with Jews who “provoke” Arab violence by living in Hebron, Shilo and the Mount of Olives. In the land of the Inquisition, the Spanish foreign ministry said Judea and Samaria Jews “constitute an obstacle to peace.”

“The potential buyers and investors should know that a future peace accord between Israel and the Palestinians or between Israel and Syria could have consequences both for properties acquired and for economic activities promoted in said settlements. In case of litigation, it could be very difficult for member states to guarantee the protection of their interests,” the Spanish statement said.

However, Madrid quickly clarified that the European boycott does not extend to “acceptable” Jewsish communities such as Tel Aviv and Ranana.

“The statement is not intended as a call for a boycott in any way, or to limit economic cooperation between Spain and Israel within its internationally-recognized borders,” Carlos Entrena Moratiel, a government spokesman, told JTA.

The Rabbinical Alliance of America – a major American mainstream rabbinic organization – has equated support for the BDS movement with being an accessory to Biblical theft and murder.

The organization urged fellow Jews to reject absolutely the ‘boycott, divestment and sanctions’ movement against Israel rather than risk transgressions of those and other Biblical prohibitions.

The 800-member organization warned in a statement issued at its recent rabbinic convocation there is a “rising tide of anti-Semitism worldwide and [the] anti-Jewish rhetoric associated with the BDS movement against the people and the State of Israel.”

In addition, the RAA said the goals of the BDS movement are so toxic they actually contravene Biblical standards for anyone who considers themselves ‘People of the Book,’ be they Jewish or not.

The movement “contravenes Biblical scripture and undermines the very foundations that assure a just and moral society for all people,” said the RAA.

“The Rabbinical Alliance views this movement as being malevolent in calling Israel an apartheid state as it utilizes inflammatory language to delegitimize the basic human rights of the Jewish people for self-determination and to live amongst its neighbors in security and safety.

“The Rabbinical Alliance calls upon members of the Jewish faith and all people of good will to reject the BDS movement in all of its variations as its goal is to harm the safety and security of the Jewish people in Israel, as well as impact its hard working Jewish citizens and Arab residents from earning their livelihood and being able to export their products to other regions of the globe.

“Any action in support of the … movement is tantamount to transgressing numerous Biblical prohibitions of theft, denial of gainful employment, the utilization of unjust weights and measurements and is considered to be a contributing factor to the very serious transgression of the shedding of blood (murder) of a fellow human being,” the rabbis wrote.

Morocco’s national soccer federation stepped in at the last minute last week to protect innocent young Moroccans from the unbridled humiliation and degradation of playing against Israeli children.

On May 27, Moroccan authorities announced they would pull two teams, made up of 11-year-olds and 13-year-olds, from the Kawkab Athletic Club Marrakech out of the Mondial Pupilles de Plomelin, an exclusive international soccer competition held annually in the city of Plomelin, France. The move was made to protest the participation of Maccabi Haifa, a club with many Arab players.

According to Afriquinfos, a French-language online news portal about African culture and politics, the decision was taken at the highest levels of Moroccan soccer and is motivated by the presence of two Israeli teams in the same group as Morocco. Allan Bossier, President of the competition, condemned the decision, saying it would create “a climate of anti-Semitism” for the competition.

“Hopefully it will not come to spoil the experience for these young people from around the world,” Bossier said.

It’s been a rough day for Palestinian supporters: Yet another unversity-based divestment attempt failed dismally at the University of Washington at the same time as an Israeli court was set to rule on the latest appeal in the decade-long legal saga of local girl Rachel Corrie, the 23-year-old activist who was crushed by an IDF bulldozer in 2003 when she made the mistake of standing in front of it.

Corrie, a member of the radical, terror-supporting International Solidarity Movement (ISM) was killed while serving as a human shield in a closed military area in the Gaza Strip, near the border with Egypt. She refused to comply with IDF instructions to vacate the area, and was then crushed to death by a military bulldozer in Gaza because the soldier driving the bulldozer could not see her from where he was seated, high up in the cab.

For the past eleven years, her parents have pursued a lawsuit in Israel’s courts to have her death declared a murder, something Israeli courts have repeatedly refused to do. Today (Wednesday) the Supreme Court will rule on the family’s appeal of a lower court ruling absolving the IDF of culpability for the incident.

IN 2011 a lower court ruled the IDF was not negligent, nor was it responsible for Corrie’s death. Moreover, the court ruled the IDF had fully and credibly investigated the circumstances surrounding the incident. By entering a closed military zone, and attempting to block the work of military bulldozers, Corrie was responsible for her own death, the court ruled.

BDS keeps on kicking, despite rejections

Sources on campus described the UW boycott issue as one of the most heated campus debates in recent memory, with furious comments both for and against the resolution in the university’s Slog news website. “Intentional or not, BDS [movement] singles out Jews for treatment that no one else gets, even countries that behave far worse. You don’t think it would be practical to aim against Syria (hmm, when was the last time Israel gassed its own citizens?)?” responded one writer.

Ironically, the University of Washington is located not far from Rachel Corrie’s hometown of Olympia, Wash.

Following the UW campaign, The Jewish Press has learned that students at the University of South Florida are also pressuring the school’s foundation to divest from companies linked to Israeli companies based in Judea and Samaria. Students this month presented a petition with 10,000 signatures to the school’s foundation urging the school to divest from corporations such as Motorola, HP and Caterpillar.

Boycott supporters have not indicated whether-or-not they will stop using cellphone, computer and internet technologies, all of which were developed in Israel, to protest the “brutal oppression” of the world’s only “apartheid” victims with the right to vote, run for office and full access to Israel’s Supreme Court.

The Executive Council of Australian Jewry has ramped up its campaign against the boycott, divestment, sanction movement (BDS) in Australia with an information booklet outlining the history and aims of the BDS movement.

The booklet, which has been distributed to politicians, journalists and public officials lays bare the hypocrisy of the BDS brigades Down Under and summarizes the movement’s activities in Australia.

“It’s important that people know the true facts about BDS,” ECAJ public affairs director Alex Ryvchin told the Australian Jewish News. that the booklet aims to expose the lies behind the anti-Israel movement in Australia. “Their aim is not to build a Palestinian state, it is to destroy the Jewish one.”

The paper said the booklet also explores the links between BDS activities in Australia and anti-Semitism, including Holocaust denial and calls for violence against Jews.

“While denying that it is anti-Semitic, the BDS campaign has consistently failed to address the anti-Semitism its actions attract and encourage, and the anti-Semitism implicit in seeking to deny the Jewish people their right for national self-determination,” the booklet says.

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) is advocating to suspend the Israeli Association of United Architects (IAUA) from the International Union of Architects (IUA).

According to a report on the BDS movement website, RIBA voted 23-16 with 10 abstentions on March 19 to boycott the Israeli organization.

The motion called on the IUA to suspend the Israeli organization’s membership “until it acts to resist these illegal projects, and observes international law, and the IUA Accords and Resolution 13….[which] states that ‘The IUA Council condemns development projects and the construction of buildings on land that has been ethnically purified or illegally appropriated, and projects based on regulations that are ethnically or culturally discriminatory, and similarly it condemns all action contravening the fourth Geneva Convention.’ “

There is rich irony in that motion, given the definitions of “ethnic purification” and “cultural discrimination” and the countless examples of its lack of relevance anywhere in Judea and Samaria, let alone in Jerusalem.

The land referred to in the motion is polka-dotted throughout Judea and Samaria with Arab and Jewish farming villages and towns – so much so, in fact, that negotiators on both sides still cannot figure out a realistic way to separate them. That’s because they live ‘cheek-and-jowl’ – the truth is, many of those communities are close neighbors and if they would have been left alone, would have remained at peace.

Anyone who has driven through Judea via Highway 60 and stopped off to shop at the Rami Levi supermarket also knows how ridiculous the accusation is. The bustling enterprise, owned by Israeli Jewish businessman Rami Levi, employs both Palestinian Authority Arabs and Israeli Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria, most of whom are observant Muslims, Christians and Jews. Moreover, the store is crowded from morning till night likewise with shoppers of the same ilk: Palestinian Authority Arabs and Israeli Jews, all of whom are residents of Judea and Samaria – all intent on one thing: making sure they get what they need for their families and getting home in time for dinner.

In Jerusalem, the accusation of “discrimination” is even sillier: there is not one major Israeli hospitality industry institution in which Arabs do not play a major role. Step into any hotel, be it rated at two stars or five, and see if you can find any staff without at least several high-ranking Arab employees. Likewise the health clinics, hospitals and other offices in the holy city. Hadassah Medical Center is headed by an Arab professional, in fact.

The word “apartheid” in the British Oxford dictionary is defined as “a policy or system of segregation or discrimination on grounds of race” that historically began with South Africa. Although it has been flung at Israel over its security and defense policies, nevertheless the facts on the ground belie the charge – as anyone with clear eyes can see.

Perhaps United Nations personnel should step out of their white cars once in a while, rather than simply drive through Arab villages, and up and down Highway 60 in the night. Were they to do so, the BDS movement would have a lot less traction.